[Redacted at OP's request] Forum

[anon3458]

[Redacted at OP's request]

[BrainsyK]

This is all standard stuff, but not a whole lot else to say.

1. Network hard in NYC, you hometown market, and any small markets that don't typically see T6 grads that you have decent ties to.
2. Bid only for corporate positions in NYC with firms that have big summer classes.
3. The battle isn't over. Try really, really hard to pull your grades up to a 3.0.
4. Practice interviewing a lot with OCS and with other people.
5. Don't be a weirdo. I cannot stress this enough. This is equally as bad as having bad grades. It's also very hard to do because being a weirdo also tends to correlate with being self-unaware so find someone who will be honest with you. If you're at Columbia, Jay Rhoderick is an excellent interview coach who will not bullshit you. Ask OCS staff and they will direct you to him.

I know one person that was in your scenario. They had a problematic personality that people could see coming a mile away. No (legal) job for them of any kind.

[Anonymous User]

It's unclear where I stand ~50% into 1L, but got Cs on two exams and desperately need to improve before Spring exams.

If I am still seemingly at the very bottom like this, how should I approach OCI? Has anyone been in this situation and still gotten a job?

So you're at NYU, I guess. What were your other grades? oCS should give out a list of firms that aren't so grade sensitive. Think mid-law/some biglaw. You definitely need to have your interview game on, and an explanation, which is what Irene is there for! You can aways improve your grades (take classes that look good but require papers as finals, if that's your strong suit) 2L and re-interview.

[thatlawlkid]

It's unclear where I stand ~50% into 1L, but got Cs on two exams and desperately need to improve before Spring exams.

If I am still seemingly at the very bottom like this, how should I approach OCI? Has anyone been in this situation and still gotten a job?

So you're at NYU, I guess. What were your other grades? oCS should give out a list of firms that aren't so grade sensitive. Think mid-law/some biglaw. You definitely need to have your interview game on, and an explanation, which is what Irene is there for! You can aways improve your grades (take classes that look good but require papers as finals, if that's your strong suit) 2L and re-interview.

is there any benefit or need for you to guess/out the school that OP went to or is that just something cool you thought you would do?

[BrainsyK]

This is all standard stuff, but not a whole lot else to say.

1. Network hard in NYC, you hometown market, and any small markets that don't typically see T6 grads that you have decent ties to.
2. Bid only for corporate positions in NYC with firms that have big summer classes.
3. The battle isn't over. Try really, really hard to pull your grades up to a 3.0.
4. Practice interviewing a lot with OCS and with other people.
5. Don't be a weirdo. I cannot stress this enough. This is equally as bad as having bad grades. It's also very hard to do because being a weirdo also tends to correlate with being self-unaware so find someone who will be honest with you. If you're at Columbia, Jay Rhoderick is an excellent interview coach who will not bullshit you. Ask OCS staff and they will direct you to him.

I know one person that was in your scenario. They had a problematic personality that people could see coming a mile away. No (legal) job for them of any kind.

So corporate only? Just so I'm understanding, it will be easier to get callbacks for corporate?

Is there a list of firms with the largest SA classes? Or do I have to look at each firm on NALP?

At least in NYC it's a pretty badly kept secrets that litigation tends to require higher grades.

Vault publishes the size of SA classes.

[QContinuum]

Lots of good advice ITT but so far no one has mentioned what I think is perhaps the most important thing OP needs to do right now: Figure out why they got not one but two Cs. I don't say this to disparage OP at all, or to rub salt into the wound. But none of the T6 have Cs on the curve. Below-curve discretionary grades are exceedingly rare, and getting two in one semester (from, presumably, two different professors) is basically unheard of at the T6. OP, have you approached those professors to figure out why you did so badly in their classes? Did you do well in your other classes first semester? You will be in a very different situation come OCI if you do much better this semester, vs. if you maintain the same performance from first semester. And at this point, pre-finals, it is still entirely possible for you to turn things around and do much better this semester.

I really think this should be OP's primary focus right now - what went wrong, and how to do better this semester. The other stuff is also important but not quite as critical right this moment.

[BrainsyK]

But none of the T6 have Cs on the curve.

Can you explain what this means?

Being on the curve means professors are bound by the administration to give a certain amount of a letter grade (e.g. 50% of the class must receive Bs). However, some discretionary is reserved to professors to give let's say an A+ to students for extraordinary performance, the bad news being that they can also exercise their discretion in the other direction.

Lots of good advice ITT but so far no one has mentioned what I think is perhaps the most important thing OP needs to do right now: Figure out why they got not one but two Cs. I don't say this to disparage OP at all, or to rub salt into the wound. But none of the T6 have Cs on the curve. Below-curve discretionary grades are exceedingly rare, and getting two in one semester (from, presumably, two different professors) is basically unheard of at the T6. OP, have you approached those professors to figure out why you did so badly in their classes? Did you do well in your other classes first semester? You will be in a very different situation come OCI if you do much better this semester, vs. if you maintain the same performance from first semester. And at this point, pre-finals, it is still entirely possible for you to turn things around and do much better this semester.

I really think this should be OP's primary focus right now - what went wrong, and how to do better this semester. The other stuff is also important but not quite as critical right this moment.

Since OP made clear that they're not going to NYU/Columbia, they're probably going to Chicago (unless they meant to include HYS in T6). According to my interpretation of the student handbook, all that's required to is to maintain a median of a 177 so it might be a UVA situation where professors are free to give really bad grades as long as they maintain a certain median. Maybe a Chicagoan could chime in on this.

In the nicest possible to OP, getting Cs usually means that they are so far off the mark that it really doesn't sound like a mistake that can be fixed with less than a month to go before Spring finals. They should obvious make an effort, but beyond that, I don't see it much salvageable. I may be wrong on this.

To be clear OP, aiming for Chicago will almost certainly kill your odds of a biglaw job unless you go to Chicago and are from Chicago. NYC is a much market to access from any of the T6s than Chicago. Your grades are at a spot where I wouldn't try to be picky about any market at EIP/OCI.

[Anonymous User]

To be clear OP, aiming for Chicago will almost certainly kill your odds of a biglaw job unless you go to Chicago and are from Chicago. NYC is a much market to access from any of the T6s than Chicago. Your grades are at a spot where I wouldn't try to be picky about any market at EIP/OCI.

This is the right take. OP: I was in your position and I bid exclusively Chicago. I came to deeply regret that decision. By all means bid Chicago firms, but you should absolutely bid New York and wherever else you may have ties.

I have ties to Chicago and I had a compelling reason to be in Chicago. At the end of the day, the Chicago market is smaller than NY and therefore the firms there can be a little choosier. I don't want to be discouraging and I think you will definitely land something great. But you will greatly increase your odds of success if you bid strategically, i.e. less grade-conscious firms in Chicago and NY.

FWIW, I struck out at OCI. I did a fellowship, then a clerkship, and then landed biglaw. But I could have (probably) saved myself a lot of time if I had bid New York firms.

[Anonymous User]

I don't want to be discouraging and I think you will definitely land something great. But you will greatly increase your odds of success if you bid strategically, i.e. less grade-conscious firms in Chicago and NY.

It's difficult, and maybe I am missing resources that are publicly accessible, but how does one find out which firms in Chicago and NYC are the least grade conscious? I would PM you but not sure how to do that with the anonymous profile.

[blair.waldorf]

I would mass mail Houston hard. They love T6 grads, and I think you would really stand out there as an applicant with your school name. NYC is great, but Houston firms love T6 students and rarely get T6 applicants other than from Harvard. I think you'd stand out there more than you would in NYC (that's not to say don't mass mail NYC--definitely mass mail NYC--but I think you'd have a solid shot at landing something in HTX).

PM me if you want to chat further. I'm happy to give advice.

[Anonymous User]

Lots of good advice ITT but so far no one has mentioned what I think is perhaps the most important thing OP needs to do right now: Figure out why they got not one but two Cs. I don't say this to disparage OP at all, or to rub salt into the wound. But none of the T6 have Cs on the curve. Below-curve discretionary grades are exceedingly rare, and getting two in one semester (from, presumably, two different professors) is basically unheard of at the T6. OP, have you approached those professors to figure out why you did so badly in their classes? Did you do well in your other classes first semester? You will be in a very different situation come OCI if you do much better this semester, vs. if you maintain the same performance from first semester. And at this point, pre-finals, it is still entirely possible for you to turn things around and do much better this semester.

I really think this should be OP's primary focus right now - what went wrong, and how to do better this semester. The other stuff is also important but not quite as critical right this moment.

OP, I had three C grades at a T6 a few years ago - just did really poorly my 1L year, and had a couple of professors trying to prove themselves by giving out as many low grades as possible (and clearly I didn't do great on my exams, since it happened to me multiple times). If you can do better this semester, great! But it honestly won't be the end of the world if you just get Bs (try not to get any more Cs). Recognize that some doors are closed, and don't try and pound on those until they open - work on the doors that are

Like others have said, I would recommend that you hustle for a 2L summer associate job as much as you can. Go to lunch with someone from every single firm in the city you'll be doing your summer job in. ANY market where you have ties, send applications or ask to chat with attorneys there. Blanket the entire country with applications. If you can get a summer associate gig at a big law firm, you're good to go, even if the grades don't get better.

If there are firms that are coming to OCI who don't get a ton of bids, see if you can find out who they are in advance and reach out and make up a reason to talk to them before - I've seen folks automatically get interviews despite mediocre screeners and grades that wouldn't get them through the door just because a partner had already told recruiting that they had talked to the associate and wanted to bring them in for a real interview. Figure out how to show genuine interest in the firms you're talking to - not 5 minutes of research which can lead you down a wrong path (for example, we had 2Ls come interview saying they wanted to do international arbitration when our firm basically doesn't do any, it's just listed on the website because like, one time someone did it). That may mean you email first year associates or other juniors from the firm who went to your law school and ask to chat for 10 minutes about their experiences.

I did none of this, by the way, because I was dumb and hadn't found TLS yet, and I still landed a job (again it was a few years ago), although OCI was a complete nightmare (one callback out of like, 35 interviews). It was really rough. Do what you can to put yourself in a good position before OCI even starts. But I've been there, and I know it doesn't seem like everything will be all right, but everything really is going to be fine. You're clearly smart and can work hard (unless someone your parents were part of the college admission scandal and bribed your way into law school), so don't get down about some unfortunately grades. I'm a little glad about my bad grades, because I think if I had ended up at a more competitive firm right out of law school I would have washed out ages ago. Instead I was at a firm that was just happy to have someone from a T6, and who assumed I was smart, and helped me rebuild my confidence. You've got this.

[icansortofmath]

Do not get more Cs. You write out answers to sample exams and MAKE professors tell you how he wants you to answer. I know someone that did this and managed to salvage her 1L GPA from 3.1 all the way up to 3.4.

Cs are huge red flags. One is understandable. Two is getting suspicious. 3 or more and you’re starting to tell people you don’t really get this law thing.

You’re realistically going to end up at jobs happy to have any T6 graduates (if geographically flexible, you can get mid/biglaw salary this way) if you can’t get your grades up a little. Pack your schedule with non-exam courses if you have to. Just don’t get another C.

Not saying you need straight As or A- or even B+. Just don’t get Cs.

[Anonymous User]

I don't want to be discouraging and I think you will definitely land something great. But you will greatly increase your odds of success if you bid strategically, i.e. less grade-conscious firms in Chicago and NY.

It's difficult, and maybe I am missing resources that are publicly accessible, but how does one find out which firms in Chicago and NYC are the least grade conscious? I would PM you but not sure how to do that with the anonymous profile.

Anon poster quoted above here. Your office of career services should have that information. Closer to OCI, they may give you a list with firms and the average gpa of everyone who got an offer at those firms. You might want to consider sitting down one-on-one with someone with OCS to come up with a list. But you definitely should poke around this site a bit. It seems like every year there is at least one thread that lists firms and ranks them on how choosey they are. There are some that are obviously choosey (Cravath) and some that are obviously less so (Katten, Mayer Brown). IME, small boutique firms are much choosier than the big firms.

I would add that the advice that litigation by and large is choosier seems accurate to me (though I am not in litigation).

[HillandHollow]

UChi grad here. A professor once explained to me that they had to curve at 177, and that they also had to have essentially the same number of people in each band of the curve. A perfect bell, in other words, or something very close to it, and 177 usually ends up being both the median and the mode. She gave an example once of when like 5 students received 182+ ("A+" grades) but she had only given 1 student a grade between 160-168 (a "D") and 1 more a grade between 155-159 (an "F"). The school kicked her grades back to her and told her she had to equalize that by dropping some of the 168s (a "C-") a point to a D, and one of the Ds to F, I think. Alternatively, she also could have dropped some of the top grades down. I forget the exact specifics, but that was the gist of it.

Anyway, to the point of this thread: definitely organize your OCI strategy NY and Chicago markets, and also consider Texas, if you're willing to go there. My class at UChi did very well in Houston, and some went also to Dallas and Austin. Re: Chicago, keep in mind that some of the firms in Chicago have only 2-5 SAs (or they did when I was in school), so they end up being way more competitive than their firm's name/vault ranking would normally be. Do not bid California, unless you have an extremely compelling reason to do so. Do not bid markets like Denver, Seattle, Portland, or really any non major market. The firms don't hire enough in those places to need to extend down the GPA scale so far.

[lawlzschool]

But none of the T6 have Cs on the curve.

Can you explain what this means?

This is objectively wrong. UChi absolutely gives (the equivalent of Cs). CN people--we get it you don't get Cs, but stop saying *none* give them out, because they do and it really sucks for us UChi people to feel like we're backwards morons just because our professors actually utilize a curve.

Source: I and many of my (smart, As in other classes, law review) classmates have gotten them

Also edited to actually be helpful: I had a well below median GPA with 2 C's. I networked my ass off and ended up with offers in two markets (NYC and Bay Area). I bid nothing in Chicago because 1. I hate it here and 2. I knew it was super competitive, so I can't really offer any good advice there. Absolutely 100% bid NYC. Absolutely 100% go to networking events and talk to people. For people with whom you click, send a follow up email and get coffee. The key is to really be aware of the line between genuine interest and idk normal interaction and gunneriness--its tough but doable.

The situation sucks. The next few months will be super stressful, but keep your chin up and you can do it.

[nixy]

Isn’t the argument that Chicago’s numerical scale helps camouflage what’s a C and what’s a B and so on? I realize lots of firms will be able to parse the Chicago numerical scale, but in theory, anyway.

[QContinuum]

But none of the T6 have Cs on the curve.

Can you explain what this means?

This is objectively wrong. UChi absolutely gives (the equivalent of Cs). CN people--we get it you don't get Cs, but stop saying *none* give them out, because they do and it really sucks for us UChi people to feel like we're backwards morons just because our professors actually utilize a curve.

Source: I and many of my (smart, As in other classes, law review) classmates have gotten them

Also edited to actually be helpful: I had a well below median GPA with 2 C's. I networked my ass off and ended up with offers in two markets (NYC and Bay Area). I bid nothing in Chicago because 1. I hate it here and 2. I knew it was super competitive, so I can't really offer any good advice there. Absolutely 100% bid NYC. Absolutely 100% go to networking events and talk to people. For people with whom you click, send a follow up email and get coffee. The key is to really be aware of the line between genuine interest and idk normal interaction and gunneriness--its tough but doable.

The situation sucks. The next few months will be super stressful, but keep your chin up and you can do it.

Thanks for chiming in and for the helpful advice to the OP.

My understanding is that Chicago doesn't give letter grades at all, hence my "no Cs on the curve" comment which I stand by. I haven't really heard UChi students use letter grades instead of their (actual) numeric grades before. I admittedly assumed OP was at C/N as those are the only two T6s that issue traditional letter grades.

[AdieuCali]

If you want to stay in the Midwest, some mid- and big-law firms in smaller markets (e.g., Indy, Cinci, Columbus, Detroit) are not particularly grade sensitive. I know a couple people at my T10 who struck out at OCI but landed SAs in those markets through mass-mail. They certainly don't pay NY market, but $120 in Milwaukee goes a lot farther than $190 in NY.

[icansortofmath]

Isn’t the argument that Chicago’s numerical scale helps camouflage what’s a C and what’s a B and so on? I realize lots of firms will be able to parse the Chicago numerical scale, but in theory, anyway.

Judging by posts in this thread, the opposite has happened.

People know a B/B- at NYU/Columbia is basically a C at other schools but they are still staring at B/B- on the transcript.

With UChi you are forced to convert numerical scale to a more typical letter curve.

This is my speculation anyway. Worth less than 2c.

[Anonymous User]

I would mass mail Houston hard. They love T6 grads, and I think you would really stand out there as an applicant with your school name. NYC is great, but Houston firms love T6 students and rarely get T6 applicants other than from Harvard. I think you'd stand out there more than you would in NYC (that's not to say don't mass mail NYC--definitely mass mail NYC--but I think you'd have a solid shot at landing something in HTX).

PM me if you want to chat further. I'm happy to give advice.

I agree, but keep in mind that the heavy hitters in Houston like K&E, Sidley and V&E are grade whores and bottom 10% at T6 will not even be brought in for an interview. Still worth including in a mass mailing, but don't get your hopes up. You're probably looking at regional firms in Houston rather than national firms.

Source: recruiting committee at one of the aforementioned firms.

[Anonymous User]

I would mass mail Houston hard. They love T6 grads, and I think you would really stand out there as an applicant with your school name. NYC is great, but Houston firms love T6 students and rarely get T6 applicants other than from Harvard. I think you'd stand out there more than you would in NYC (that's not to say don't mass mail NYC--definitely mass mail NYC--but I think you'd have a solid shot at landing something in HTX).

PM me if you want to chat further. I'm happy to give advice.

I agree, but keep in mind that the heavy hitters in Houston like K&E, Sidley and V&E are grade whores and bottom 10% at T6 will not even be brought in for an interview. Still worth including in a mass mailing, but don't get your hopes up. You're probably looking at regional firms in Houston rather than national firms.

Source: recruiting committee at one of the aforementioned firms.

I disagree with this some, just two pieces of anecdotal evidence but a friend and I, both near bottom 25% at Uchicago, got offers at two of those three each.

[carsondalywashere]

Not NYU or Columbia and aiming for the Chicago market.

So I should bid corporate only? How does one find out which firms have the largest SA classes (other than going one-by-one through NALP). Is there a list somewhere?

Please note that Chicago litigation is very difficult to obtain. Not sure how NYU/Columbia plays in Chicago (have met a few folks from those schools) but I do know you need to be above median at Northwestern to be competitive for Chicago lit.